COLUMBUS, Miss. – Mississippi University for Women’s Ghanshyam Heda, professor of biology in the Department of Sciences and Mathematics, received a Fulbright award to India, where he will continue his research on cystic fibrosis and teach graduate students.

“Receiving a Fulbright award is an honor not only for me, but also for our university,” said Dr. Heda. “This award will give me an opportunity to take my current research on cystic fibrosis to the next level.”

The Fulbright Program aims to increase mutual understanding between the people of the United States and the people of other countries. It is the flagship international educational exchange program sponsored by the U.S. government.

Heda will be hosted by the University of Hyderabad, a large research-intensive university in the city of Hyderabad in south-central India. There he will teach courses on physiology and protein biochemistry to graduate students while also researching proteins that interact with the cystic fibrosis causing protein and also play a role in epidemic cholera.

In addition to his research and teaching, Heda will assist two local colleges in setting up undergraduate research programs.

“I also have invitations to visit and lecture at other institutions in India and neighboring country Sri Lanka on my research and ways to motivate high school and undergraduate students to pursue their dreams,” added Heda.

Fulbright alumni have become heads of state, judges, ambassadors, cabinet ministers and CEOs, as well as leading journalists, artists, scientists and teachers. They include 59 Nobel Laureates, 82 Pulitzer Prize winners, 71 MacArthur Fellows, 16 Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients and thousands of leaders across the private, public and non-profit sectors.

The Fulbright Program was established in 1946 by Sen. J. William Fulbright of Arkansas. Sponsored by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, the program awards approximately 8,000 grants annually. Since its inception, more than 380,000 "Fulbrighters" have participated in the program.

In advance of his Fulbright assignment, Heda will attend the Bioinformatics T3: Train the Trainer Course at MDI Biological Laboratory in Salisbury Cove, Maine, June 30-July 7. The week-long workshop provides training in bioinformatics skills for college and university undergraduate science instructors. Mississippi and New Hampshire INBRE program sponsored by NIH are sponsoring Heda’s travel to attend this workshop.

Since joining The W in 2008, Heda has led student research to seek a better treatment for cystic fibrosis patients. He has received a grant from the Mississippi IDeA Network of Biomedical Research Excellence for eight consecutive years for his cystic fibrosis research. Many students trained by him in his research laboratory have moved on to graduate and medical schools.